Red Bull‘s junior Formula One team, formerly known as Toro Rosso and then AlphaTauri, has been renamed Visa Cash App RB ahead of the 2024 season, the team announced on Wednesday.
Red Bull hopes the new deal will help move the team, known for giving F1 debuts to reigning world champion Max Verstappen and four-time world champion Sebastian Vettel, up the competitive order and into the upper midfield.
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The deal is Visa’s “first major global sports sponsorship in more than 15 years”, according to Wednesday’s announcement, and further strengthens Red Bull’s F1 ties with the United States. While its senior team, the reigning world champions, are already in a title partnership with Oracle and in a technical partnership with Ford. Visa’s logo will also appear on the Red Bull car.
How fans and media will refer to the company’s second team under its new guise remains to be seen — Red Bull insists the full name is Visa Cash App RB, but within the company it is being referred to as V-CARB.
It was reported for much of last year the team would be called ‘Racing Bulls’ but this has been dropped — sources have told ESPN that name was met with resistance internally — leading to the RB acronym being used instead.
Sources have told ESPN that both JP Morgan and Hugo Boss had been in the running to secure a naming deal last year, before Visa and Cash App emerged as leading candidates.
Visa Cash App RB will continue to operate primarily out of Toro Rosso/AlphaTauri’s headquarters in Faenza, Italy, although it is moving parts of the operation to Red Bull’s UK factory in Milton Keynes.
Team boss Peter Bayer said the new deal will help drive Visa Cash App RB up the grid.
“It’s fantastic to reveal the new identity and to welcome new partners as we embark on the next phase of the team’s Formula One story,” he said in a statement.
“Faenza is entering a new era of racing, staying true to our roots as a hothouse for talent but now with an even greater focus on competing for the biggest prizes in F1. We have a bold vision for the team led by myself and team principal Laurent Mekies and having future-focused partners such as Visa and Cash App alongside us on that journey is hugely exciting.”
Visa and Cash App will also partner with Red Bull’s second entry in the F1 Academy, the series aimed at promoting young female talent up the racing pyramid.
Early last year, Red Bull turned down an offer to purchase the junior team — Mark Mateschitz, who owns 49% of the energy drinks company, said that his late father Dietrich had always wanted to race with two teams in the sport — and instead the company turned its attention towards securing a naming partner in a bid to make the team more competitive.
One of the reasons Red Bull never seriously considered promoting Daniel Ricciardo to replace Sergio Perez last season was the desire for the Australian, a seven-time race winner, to lead the newly named team into a new era.
The team’s set up with Red Bull is a talking point going into the new season, with some Visa Cash App RB personnel moving to Red Bull’s Milton Keynes factory.
Red Bull insiders have said that Faenza will remain the operational hub of the team. At least one rival team is not convinced — McLaren boss Zak Brown has already highlighted his concern over the closer partnership as a potential way to circumnavigate F1’s budget cap.
Red Bull has declined to comment directly on Brown’s latest comments on the partnership.
While Red Bull has won six constructors’ championships since joining in 2004, its second team, which joined the grid the following year, has had limited success in F1.
It has been more commonly known as the training ground for Red Bull’s brightest young talents. Vettel, who went on to become a four-time world champion with Red Bull, claimed the energy drinks company’s first ever F1 victory when he won for Toro Rosso (Italian for Red Bull), at the 2008 Italian Grand Prix.
Pierre Gasly repeated that triumph by winning the Italian Grand Prix in 2020, by which point the team had been renamed after Red Bull’s fashion brand AlphaTauri.
Three-time world champion Verstappen made his debut with the team in 2015. Alex Albon, who races for Williams, and Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz also started their F1 careers with the team.
Under its AlphaTauri guise, which it took on in 2020, it finished 7th, 6th, 9th and 8th in the constructors’ championship.
Source: www.espn.com